SEAA Combined Events

By Joe, 19 July, 2016

Horspath Road hosted the SEAA Combined Events Championships on the weekend of 16th & 17th July.

The stand-out performer for Oxfordshire was Tim Stephens (OCAC), a comfortable winner of the U20 Decathlon with a pb score of 6355 points. This total took the 18 year-old up to 5th in the national rankings. Coached by Marcia Marriott, Tim’s track marks were particularly strong and included a time of 50.58 for a clear win in the 400, 15.45 for the 110 Hurdles, and 4:26.33 for the final event, the 1500.

The County’s second medallist on the day was Zoe Pollock (Banbury), with 3rd place in the U17 Women’s Heptathlon. Zoe’s points score of 3931 saw her finish a tantalising 4 points behind the silver medallist. Her best marks also came on the track, in the 80 Hurdles (12.62), 200 (26.57) and 800 (2:28.12).

The U17 event saw the strongest Oxfordshire entry overall, with five young athletes from the County competing. Jade O’Dowda was a potential winner, but withdrew, as the competition leader, after five events – 11.66 80 Hurdles, 1.67 High Jump, 11.94 Shot, 26.62 200, and 5.31 Long Jump. Another member of Marcia Marriott’s coaching squad, Jade is ranked second nationally in the Heptahlon, behind the Scots leader, Holly McArthur.

Victoria Harte (Radley) and Rebecca Scott (Banbury) finished in 6th and 7th places in the same U17 event, amassing 3659 and 3573 points respectively. Petrina Chantler Edmond (Radley), another of the impressive Peter O’Keefe squad at Radley, was the other Oxfordshire non-finisher, opting out of the 800.

Oxfordshire had three finishers in the U15 Girls Pentathlon. Holly Griffiths-Brown (Radley) was 4th with 2753 points, boosted by a useful 12.40 in the 75 Hurdles. Her clubmate, Kylah Rowlands, took 6th place with 2562 points, while Elizabeth Eskender (Banbury) finished 11th with 1676 points.

In the U20W Heptathlon, Alice Hopkins (Radley) withdrew after four events, which included 14.55 for her specialist 100 Hurdles event.